7/8/19

Busy day.  Caught self overthinking a bit ago.  But resolved.  Don’t think.  Just move, act, create.

Going shopping for some new work articles, then home for dinner, little writing and bed early.  Tomorrow a 4am-er. Told Abraham I’d be there, and more than that I WANT to be there.  For me.  Try for 9 miles.  Then the next day, the next, and all remaining.

Rest of day planned to not any kind of boring degree.  Hear people around me in leave mode, but I’m still in the propelled personification I had this morning. Work, as an idea, and one stretching from wine.  I think about all the work that involves in winemaking, how strenuous it is, the early rises but even more than that, the containment, more than focus or fixation, but IT.  The IT to it all.  All this.

Setting out running uniform, or not uniform but you know what I mean, tonight.  Shoes out, untied, phone charged, headphones, everything.  If I can, leave before 4 like I did that one time.

Phone at desk set up, voice message and my name for in-office comm.  Only minutes from leave.  Day for tomorrow more or less planned.  Meeting in morning, out in Field later in day and for most of the day’s remainder.

Put trash cans out.  Can’t forget to do that… not that exciting a detail but one with which everyone is familiar.  In bed before ten, the aim.  Going over to-do plate, not so much a list just a bunch of slop on a plate.

4:50, been chewing this gum since before the meeting we just had, which started at 3 and Shannon and myself nearly missed having lunch out right before.  Work versus time.  How to approach, how to consider, how to be place and put-together as character, for character and story.

mikemadiganLeave a comment

Minutes before team gets here.  Selling everything like I do wine, I tell myself about something I have approaching.  Selling should never be selling as I’ve noted in the past, in recent entries and if not then recent writings.  Genuine, present, connected communication.  Telling the story while listening to someone else’s narrative and deeply considering that.  An interaction but more.  More rich and textured talk.  Thinking of how the wineries I’ve worked at in the past, and other jobs, how their intention and focus on the sale, on conversion, is far too obvious.

I’ve now elected to embody new motion, a new beat for the purpose of building business and selling.  And that is to do anything but. Talk to people, meet them, know them better than I know what I’m representing.  Wine is life, and I sell life, if anything.  How incredible it is to be here, PRESENT, and with the opportunity to know people, know what they want, help them get there… to their There.

Not many people like to be sold, or want to be.  They want to be happy, they want to enjoy the moment, the conversation.  That’s my focus, their enjoyment of the interaction.  Still developing these notes, but I am developing them and playing with approaches and methods of doing so.  So…. Off into the Field and day, where I put such to practice.

mikemadiganLeave a comment

from sales journal

Photo on 5-27-18 at 8.52 AMNo other work I’ve had or found myself in has taught me more than wine and its industry, the functionality of it business, businesses and the many shade it can assume.  First, obviously, conversation, relationships, and having those relationships progress in a truthful and reciprocally educating form.  So many talk customer service, swear by it and even judge from their views on its conceptual anatomy, but don’t practice, don’t actuate what they so militantly advocate.  When someone walks into a tasting room, or even onto the winery property, I’ve learned to not be in a sales mood and mode at all.  Say ‘hello’, ask them about THEM, what their story is, how long they’re in town, and all similar.

Wine’s industry has also taught me that you should never sell.  Rather, share passion, educated through conversation, but be present in the interaction with your potential buyer, or just someone visiting.  What if they are there, at your business, just to visit, look? You can’t scold them, though I’ve seen some people do just that, their mood changing when learning the person isn’t with intent to brandish a credit card.  Market yourself, as a kind human being in business, wine business has taught me.

I’ve also learned from wine that you shouldn’t too much see it, whatever you do for a living, as work, or too much as a chore.  It should be passion, it should be love, it should not be—whatever you do for a living, wine’s industry or a dentist, policeman or grocery store owner, anything—horror, something you dread, or wake up thinking “I have to do that.” Whatever your work is, it should be your life’s work, your life, what and who you are.  Not merely what you do.  Wine tells me not to settle, in business.  To write my own story, to be alive and fiery, loud and unwavering, loving and kind to everyone that sets shoe soles on property.

(5/27/18)

mikemadiganLeave a comment